Algae blooms create foul odor along Fox River

Algae had grown so thick on Lake Catherine this summer that Marilyn Belleau felt like she could walk on water. She was afraid to swim in it, and her husband could not even fish in it without his line getting stuck.

In Aurora and Elgin, calls poured in from residents complaining of the foul taste and smell of their drinking water. The cause? A chemical released by decaying algae.

The problem started in Antioch's Lake Catherine and traveled down the Fox River about 40 miles to Elgin and then another 30 miles to Aurora. The problem affected hundreds of thousands of people, but finding a solution was the responsibility of the Fox Waterway Agency.

Antioch, Elgin and Aurora residents were frustrated because of the algae this summer. The Fox Waterway Agency wishes it could help combat the issue, but it does not have the money, Fox Waterway Agency Executive Director Joe Keller said.

Until the agency's capabilities grow, it cannot help lower the amount of algae in the waterway, leaving homeowners and water treatment plants to deal with it themselves, Keller said.

"Essentially when you give less to something, essentially the quality is going to be less," Keller said. "And now the symptoms of what we're seeing today is essentially as a result, in my eyes, of putting less resources and sending zero monies back to the system."

Algae blooms occur because of a number of conditions, according to Mike Adam, a senior biologist with the Lake County Health Department. One condition in the Chain O'Lakes is the abundance of phosphorus and nitrogen stored in sediment under the water.

The nutrients enter the water through urban runoff and erosion of farm fields in Wisconsin then flow downstream. Phosphorus and nitrogen are naturally abundant in productive soil, according to Tom Slawski, president of Southeast Fox River Partnership and chief biologist of the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission's Natural Resources Planning and Management Division. The two nutrients help plants — including algae — grow.

"The challenge is, when you're cultivating it, like when you're putting in a new lawn, you till it all up and have a rainfall event, then the sewers in the urban area are running black with sediment," Slawski said. "So a failed lawn can load just as much phosphorous load, if not more, than a farm field. Or just equally as much. Maybe it's not 40 acres, it's just a third of an acre. That's a challenge."

When the nutrient-rich sediment is not dredged from the waterway, it stays in the system. An EPA study found 40 percent of phosphorus in the Upper Fox/Chain O'Lakes system comes from internal loading, or the depositing of a chemical in sediments over time that causes the sediments to become a source.

The Fox Waterway Agency dredges as much sediment as it can each year, but money limits how much sediment the agency can remove, Keller said. What remains in the water can act as fertilizer for algae.

Enjoying the water

John Vrchota has lived on Lake Catherine since 1998 and said he has been visiting the lake since 1968. He remembers when it was crystal clear and had a sandy bottom.

He said it got "a little worse" over the past 30 years, but in his opinion this year was the worst. The algae stretched about 200 feet onto the shoreline to the point where some of his neighbors could not put their boats or jet skis in the water. When the algae started to decay, it turned brown and emitted a "terrible smell," he said.

"It was not a pleasant thing," Vrchota said.

He was upset, and so were other residents. They were also nervous the material could be toxic. Belleau called the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency to test the algae.

The agency ruled the algae safe, and Adam echoed that ruling. Still, Vrchota and Belleau were upset. The algae was safe, but they did not want to swim or let their families swim in water that was more green than blue.

"If it's getting worse, something has to be done to make it better," Belleau said. "It affects our life, and I'm so sad. We have a lake house for our family, and when our family doesn't want to come because they can't use the water, then, you know, that's not what it's about."

Drinking the water

The staff at the Aurora water treatment plant had no idea the problem was coming. They constantly monitor the river water, and typical indicators of an algae bloom did not show any reason for concern, according to Dave Schumacher, superintendent of water production.

As calls flooded in, Schumacher realized how serious the situation was. The water was perfectly safe to drink, but the taste and odor did not match customers' standards.

The city typically uses a mix of 60 percent river water and 40 percent well water. For the first time since the plant opened in 1992, the city stopped inflow of river water altogether and relied solely on well water between June 20 and July 13, Schumacher said.

"We did what we could." Schumacher said. "It had never been done, but we felt it was necessary."

Elgin had not seen a taste and odor outbreak like this since 1996. The city usually relies almost entirely on river water, and its wells do not supply enough water to rely solely on them during an event like this, according to Elgin Water Director Kyla Jacobsen.

The water treatment plant was able to blend about 50 percent of well water into the river water in addition to adding more carbon to improve the taste and odor throughout the 26-day outbreak, Jacobsen said. And though the water was not particularly enjoyable, Jacobsen stressed that it was perfectly safe to drink.

"These taste and odor compounds, while they're not particularly favorable, they are an aesthetic issue not a water quality issue," Jacobsen said.

Schumacher said phosphorus and nitrogen, the nutrients that contribute to algae growth, are filtered out in the cities' treatment plants. They have extensive operations to transform river water into clean, safe drinking water.

In Aurora, the river water and well water enter through two different tanks and are combined at the beginning of the treatment process. The water passes through claricone reactors, where the lime softening process occurs, and chlorine is added, he said. Solids fall to the bottom of the container and are removed as clean water rises.

The water flows through recarbonation tanks where it is stabilized. It then flows through 12 filters of gravel, sand, and granular activated carbon and chlorine. It finally leaves the inside of the water treatment plant, receives chlorine as a disinfectant, and is stored in an underground reservoir before going to a wet well and pump station, Schumacher said.

Employees monitor the water all day throughout every step of the process. It also monitors the river water coming into the plant. Dredging up in the Chain can increase the number of nutrients in the river water, so the process must be tweaked to accommodate this.

"Everything's related," Schumacher said, "just like in nature."

Finding a solution

Fighting algae can be difficult. No two seasons are the same, and there are a number of factors that contribute to its growth.

And while Aurora and Elgin can problem-solve ways to combat taste and odor problems associated with algae, some residents along Lake Catherine feel helpless. The Fox Waterway Agency does not own a weed harvester to remove algae from the lake, and it does not have the money to purchase one, Keller said.

Officials are struggling to remove years of sediment that has built up in the Chain O'Lakes and Fox River.

When the algae outbreak began, Belleau walked around her neighborhood and found that her neighbors were just as upset as she was. They wanted to do something. Then she met Amy Littleton.

Littleton researched problems and solutions for improving conditions in the lake. She decided the neighbors needed to take action and organized a meeting in July. Belleau and her sister, who also lives on the lake, went door-to-door with fliers.

About 35 people met at 6:30 p.m. July 1 to hear from Diane Tancl from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and Jim Meyer from the Fox Waterway Agency. The group left having decided on five next steps, with the first being to formally establish "Friends of Catherine and Channel Lakes" as a nonprofit organization.

"We believe that we need to be organized, that we need to come together as a community to manage the lake in a way that's going to make sure it is clean and a beautiful and wonderful and valuable amenity for everyone," Littleton said. "Not just for people who live on the lake, but people who visit, the marinas and boat launches, and just for the future."

The group will hold its next meeting Sept. 2. One option it's considering is installing an aerator that would help circulate oxygen through the lake. Another is to look into weed removal.

Both options are used in other waterways, but their effects vary. The Fox Waterway Agency used to operate an aerator in Lake Catherine, but deemed it ineffective and discontinued it. Weed removal can be helpful, but too much removal can also be harmful, Adam said.

And while poor water conditions in Channel Lake and Lake Catherine can spread down south, good water conditions would likely not since the two lakes are north of where the Fox River enters the Chain.

"If Channel and Catherine do some things but nothing's done in the Fox River itself, then they wouldn't probably see much of anything down in Elgin and Aurora," Adam said.

Still, residents like Vrchota are excited to work together to find ways to keep their lake clean. He said it's great when his children and grandchildren visit and enjoy the water, but that's difficult with such widespread algae blooms.

"To see the way it looked, you were afraid to even let them go near the water. You can't go in the water, you're afraid of even the way it looked, you know," he said. "You want to pass this onto your kids and your grandkids, and it's an important part of the entire area. I mean, the Chain is huge, and it's something we should respect and take care of."